Khoi, who’s consistently one of the best writers on the web, recently took a swipe at enterprise software. Who can blame him? We agree.

If you work at a big company and you’ve ever had to do something that should be simple, like file an expense report, make changes to your salary withholdings — or, heck, if you’ve ever tried to apply for a job at a big company — then you’ve probably encountered these confounding user experiences. And you probably cursed out loud.

Then he opines:

I have to wonder: what is it about the world of enterprise software that routinely produces such inelegant user experiences?

My take: The Buyers Aren’t the Users

The people who buy enterprise software aren’t the people who use enterprise software. That’s where the disconnect begins. And it pulls and pulls and pulls until the user experience is split from the buying experience so severely that the software vendors are building for the buyers, not the users. The experience takes a back seat to the feature list, future promises, and buzz words.